


Princess Clarke kom Skaikru, The Girl Who Fell from the Stars

by SingingTheThunder



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Bilingual Character(s), Canon-Typical Bondage, Gen, Makeover, Somehow not crack, Swearing, That's not canon-typical though, discussion of canon-typical violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-19
Updated: 2018-07-19
Packaged: 2019-06-13 01:46:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,307
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15353511
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SingingTheThunder/pseuds/SingingTheThunder
Summary: In a universe adjacent to canon where due to various shenanigans the original hundred end up seeking refuge in Polis, Murphy proves himself to be more useful than anticipated.In other words: Clarke, don't question how Murphy knows what a debutante ball is, just run with the makeover montage.





	Princess Clarke kom Skaikru, The Girl Who Fell from the Stars

**Author's Note:**

> I swear this made sense as a concept when I woke up after not enough sleep this morning.
> 
> I keep seeing things where people question that season 1 Murphy could ever be useful without going through various torments. Bellamy did a truly terrible job as Murphy's handler, but I don't think he made a bad call on picking Murphy in the first place. The mistake he made was thinking he needed to rule through fear alone, be that fear of Murphy, fear of the Grounders or fear of the Ark.
> 
> So, an attempt at explaining what even season 1 Murphy could offer. While trying not to ignore, forgive or blame on Bellamy his actions during that time.
> 
> And Clarke learns the importance of Costume.

Clarke had known someone would cause trouble sooner or later. She’d even suspected it would be Murphy, but it’s been barely three hours since they straggled, muddy and exhausted, through the gates of Polis. All Clarke wants is a bath and to collapse onto the fur covered bed her status as Skaikru ambassador gives her.

 

Of course it’s never that simple, in another two hours she’s expected to present herself for the first time to the Coalition’s other ambassadors and bend the knee to Heda Lexa. So dealing with a scowling John Murphy, who’s been forced to his knees at her feet, with hands bound behind his back and a fresh black eye, is really really low on the list of things she wants to be doing.

 

“ _Klark, Bandrona en Hainofi kom Skaikru, disha skat jak -”_

 

“ _Gonasleng, beja, Vala,”_ Clarke asks, if they’re discussing this she’d rather not have to rely on her shaky knowledge of Trigedasleng. Murphy might be a complete idiot, but she still doesn’t want to order him executed accidentally.

 

Vala scowls, her English is nearly as shaky as Clarke’s Trigedasleng. Clarke half wonders which of them Lexa is punishing by assigning Vala as her bodyguard. It’s probably both.

 

“Klark, Princess of Skaikru, the boy stole food,” Vala reports, clearly upset at not being able to elaborate.

 

Murphy barely bothers to try and hide his snort of amusement at Vala calling Clarke ‘Princess.’ Sadly, it seems to have stuck as the correct title for the Grounders to use. Probably because they’d been very confused when she hadn’t been able to offer another. Vala whacks him on the back of his head and his sulkiness returns.

 

“Murphy ...” Clarke starts, she’s tired and aching and alone in an alien country and she does not want to do this, any of this. “Vala, please leave us.”

 

There’s a stubborn set to Vala’s jaw that Clarke has very quickly learned means her bodyguard is displeased with the order, but she obeys, presumably having concluded Murphy isn’t much of a threat.

 

Murphy, shockingly, remains silent, watching her with the stillness of a rat that hasn’t yet figured out if it saw a snake or just a suspicious branch.

 

Clarke’s got nothing. She sighs and sits on the edge of her bed, massages her forehead and fights against the urge to cry. “You’re an idiot, Murphy,” she tells him, as though she isn’t feeling like one herself right now. “What the hell am I supposed to do about this?”

 

It’s a rhetorical question, one she doesn’t have the answer to, but Murphy actually answers, “Probably hit me.” He must pick up on her confusion, because he shrugs awkwardly and adds, “Better you establish this stuff early. You can’t let us do whatever to our _hosts_ and you lose power if you let them choose the sentence.”

 

“Murphy, did you _deliberately_ get caught as some sort of … political … thing?” Clarke has genuine trouble believing he’d even make that suggestion, she knows he’d do anything to save his own skin.

 

“ _What?!_ No! I’m not a floating masochist,” Murphy says and Clarke isn’t quite as certain as he is about the last part. He’s certainly ready enough to provoke others to violence. “They kill thieves,” he adds in a mumble.

 

“I’m not going to hit you, Murphy,” Clarke says, as gently as she can manage. “I won’t let them kill you either.”

 

“Then get Bellamy to do it,” Murphy suggests, no hesitation, “Because if you do _nothing_ , we’re all dead or slaves. They start thinking you’re too weak to control your own people or that you don’t care what we do to them. You force them to either overrule your decision or look like _they_ can’t control us ether. Then you’re forced to either back down and they take what little power you have or you resist and make it a fight. Neither of those end well for me. Or you, I guess.”

 

If Clarke had had to make a list of people who could give her lessons on ruling, John Murphy wouldn’t have occurred to her for a second, but he’s right. She hates it and maybe him as well, but the idiot is right.

 

“So, what you’re telling me,” she says slowly, “is that even knowing that if you got caught those would be the options available to me, _you still went ahead and stole anyway?_ ”

 

“Uh, I was hungry?” He actually looks a little ashamed of himself, finally.

 

“Murphy, you’re an idiot,” Clarke tells him again, more confidently this time.

 

To her surprise he laughs. “So I’ve heard. You’ve been living in softness too long, Princess. If you can’t do what’s necessary to survive, find someone who will.”

 

Clarke stands and draws her knife, the same knife with which she’d mercy killed Atom. Murphy flinches, but she cuts his hands free. “I’ll talk to Bellamy tomorrow,” she decides, as he rubs the rope burns on his wrists. They’re not as bad as she’d expected, he must have known not to struggle. She carefully doesn’t think about where he would have learned that.

 

He doesn’t stand until she offers him a hand up, then pushes himself up without taking it. He hesitates, eyes flicking towards the door. “Look, can I stay here tonight? I don’t mind sleeping on the floor. It’s just … if I go back I’m not sure Bellamy will wait until you’ve talked to him.”

 

Once again, Clarke has to admit Murphy has read the situation correctly from a different angle. One that, naturally, revolves around his own well being. On the face of it, it hardly seems to matter if Bellamy beats Murphy tonight or tomorrow, but if he fails to wait for Clarke’s permission it’s as much a sign of her inability to control her people as showing mercy would be.

 

“You can stay,” Clarke says. See what sacrifices she makes for her people. “But unless you think showing up to a meeting without bathing or changing first is a smart move, I’m going to need some privacy.”

 

“A meeting? Tonight?” Murphy frowns. “Bastards. They _know_ we’re refugees. Try not to look too much like, well, reality.”

 

“Heda Lexa has _kindly_ lent me some dresses, it’s fine,” Clarke says, then calls Vala back in to order a bath and to keep an eye on Murphy.

 

“Huh,” is all Murphy has to say on the subject before following Vala outside.

 

Clarke feels, if not at her best, better for a bath. She’s more awake, she’d asked for colder water than her aching bones wanted for exactly that purpose, she’s cleaner and she’s got an idea how this is going to work.

 

She steps out of her door to find Vala and Murphy laughing together. For a second she thinks she’s fallen asleep in the bath, she hasn’t been able to get as much as a smile out of Vala the whole two weeks they’ve been traveling together. Vala’s English is poor and Murphy’s Trigedasleng is non-existent and less than half an hour ago Vala was leading Murphy to her as a prisoner.

 

“No, no,” Vala says, “Jo _k_ a.”

 

“ _Joka_ ,” Murphy repeats accompanying it with a rude gesture and Vala throws back her head and laughs.

 

Oh, of course. They’re teaching each other swearwords. Clarke doesn’t know what she expected. She clears her throat and the two of them turn to her with identical guilty expressions. “Murphy, you should -” she starts, but before she can say anything more Murphy is shoving her back through the door to her room. Vala follows, curious and wary, but not yet doing anything about the Skychild putting hands on her ward.

 

“Murphy, what the hell?” Clarke slaps at his hands, but he darts away to start rummaging through the cupboards.

 

“You can’t wear that,” he ‘explains’, finding what Clarke already knew, that she has next to nothing.

 

“Lexa gave it to me,” Clarke says, not understanding at all.

 

“And that’s great if you want to show up to your debutante ball dressed as Lexa’s pet Skygirl,” Murphy drawls.

 

“Show up to my what?”

 

“Your first impression to the important Grounder council people,” he clarifies, dropping the one change of clothes Clarke has on the bed. “You’ve got a few options. Wear that thing and you’re Lexa’s pet, a curiosity, like dressing a dog in a suit. Dress up as a Grounder and it’s painfully obvious you’re not one. Normal clothes and you’re the refugee from the stars who’s demanding their land and food. You need to be Princess Clarke come Sky.”

 

“Kom Skaikru,” Clarke corrects automatically, “I don’t _have_ anything.”

 

Murphy grins triumphantly. “And that’s our Princess. Something from nothing. Put it on.” He’s busy doing something with her backpack, so Clarke hesitantly pulls the trousers on under the dress, then quickly swaps it for her top with her back to him.

 

It’s a very basic base, trousers and a vest top both in slightly different shades of faded black. There’s a full length mirror in the corner, Clarke had spent more time than she’d admit admiring the silky fabric of the rich blue dress Lexa had sent to her. She’d thought she looked beautiful, but she has to admit she’s more comfortable in this, even if she can only see the refugee from the stars.

 

Something drops over her head and she startles, until she sees that Murphy has made a kind of sash from the seatbelt straps of her backpack. Now she just looks silly.

 

“Murphy, this is …” she says, but then he grabs her arm and starts removing her father’s watch. Clarke yanks her arm away. “Don’t touch that!”

 

He raises his hands in surrender. “I was just thinking you could make a sort of crown out of it. Like how Lexa has the cog on her forehead. Remind them about technology. What we’re giving them, not what we’re asking for.”

 

It sounds like a good idea, but Clarke still isn’t willing to hand over her father’s watch to him. Oddly it’s Vala who solves the problem, drawing her knife and cutting one of the leather strands bound into her belt free. She drops the strand into Clarke’s hands. Clarke smiles in thanks and Vala nods back, expression as blank as ever, but Clarke thinks they understand.

 

“Great, if you two are finished eye-fucking?” Murphy reminds them how little time they have.

 

Tying the watch to the strand is easy, but Murphy has to help her get it held securely against her forehead. He mostly keeps his hands to the leather, only touching the watch when it’s necessary. Murphy roughly spins her to face him once he’s done, clearly still not satisfied. She can’t blame him, all he’s managed is to make her look like a joke.

 

He shrugs off his jacket and offers it to her. It’s too big and smells of Murphy which is really not something she wants to experience now or ever again, but the stiff leather feels a little like armour, a shield between her and the judgement of others. She wonders if Murphy uses it for the same reason. He does look smaller without it, if no less belligerent. Clarke can almost see the Skaikru Princess in the mirror now, reaching up to run her hand over the patch of spikes on one shoulder.

 

“I want that back, so don’t go rummaging through the pockets or get shot in it or anything,” Murphy tells her and she knows what it is to have so few things that the loss of anything is a tragedy.

 

“Thank you,” she tells him and he shrugs it off and if she sees a glint of water in his eye, she’s not cruel enough to mention it.

 

“My ass on the line as well if you can’t pull this off, Princess,” Murphy says after a moment.

 

Clarke takes one last look around the room, the costume helps, she can feel the protective anger settle over her, making her walk taller, keep her head up, hold eye contact. But there’s something …

 

She hopes Lexa isn’t offended by her refusal of the dress, it really is very pretty, but Clarke isn’t here to be pretty. It’s the thought of Lexa that gives her the idea.

 

“Vala? Do you have, uh, _yu kofon_ …” She can’t think of the word for ‘have’ so uses ‘trade’ instead. That one she’s been using a lot. “ _Gon – gonplei woda?_ ” Unsure the request for fighting water makes any sense, she mimes smearing something on her face.

 

“ _Feisblaken?_ ” Vala asks and _obviously_ that’s what it’s called. What else would you call the black stuff you put on your face? Then again Clarke guesses facepaint isn’t any less subtle a name.

 

“ _Sha, beja.”_

 

“Clarke, can whatever it is wait? Fashionably late is one thing …” Murphy is suddenly full of nervous energy.

 

Vala unhooks one of the pouches from her braided belt and holds it out. Clarke opens it and is relieved to find she’s communicated what she wanted correctly. She scoops some out onto a finger, then hesitates, looking at herself in the mirror.

 

Her dad used to have a couple of CDs from Earth and she remembers holding the case of one as he sat her on his knee and sang along. The singer in the picture had had facepaint, more complicated than she can manage quickly on herself and red and gold, but the basic shape works.

 

After all, she fell from the sky.

 

She draws a single line on her cheek, starting from her eye like a tear, just one side, then wipes the paint off her hand.

 

When she looks in the mirror now, she sees the Princess. Abandoned, fallen, survivor who will not beg but must ask, who has nothing and yet will make that nothing something.

 

Crying a single black lightning bolt.


End file.
